


Nico, Would You?

by NainThePain



Category: Runaways (Comics), Runaways (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, But would do anything Karolina wanted, Coffee Shop, F/F, Nico's oblivious at first
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:20:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27643348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NainThePain/pseuds/NainThePain
Summary: Nico's been working at Timely Coffee forever, and she's always done what she wants.But when her new coworker shows up, all it takes is a "Nico, would you?" and suddenly Nico's doing exactly what she's asking.And really, she justhatesit.
Relationships: Karolina Dean/Nico Minoru
Comments: 12
Kudos: 117





	Nico, Would You?

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based on Rulolarata's comment on another one of my fics, _Everything I Never Believed In_ , saying "I swear, that way Karolina has of saying "Nico, would you?" can make Nico take the blame for murder XD."
> 
> Thanks for the inspiration, and I hope people like this fic!

Nico’s been working at Timely Coffee for years. 

She started in high school, coming by after class every day for her shifts, even staying late to close up on days she had tests the next morning. She paid her dues, working through the worst shifts where she’d have to get up at ungodly hours to open the café, even though no customer in their right mind would show up anytime before seven in the morning. 

When she finally finished her four gruelling years of high school, she stuck with Timely instead of looking for something more exciting, working full time while she earns money and tries to figure out what she wants to do with the rest of her life. 

Really, over the past three and half years, she’s been nothing but loyal to Timely Coffee, so is it too much to ask that she receive the same in return?

Apparently so because, somehow, a new barista had been hired without her input, and she’s not even _remotely_ happy about it. 

It’s not like Nico’s a crazy control freak or anything, obviously every decision doesn’t need to be run by her. But she does have seniority. So the very least the manager could have done was ask her input before hiring this random, sunshiney girl who doesn’t seem to know the first thing about coffee. Or customer service. Or really anything at all to do with what she was hired to do. 

And yet somehow, this girl still has a job. Honestly, mostly thanks to Nico at this point, because for some stupid reason, she just can’t seem to say no to her. 

Nico sighs, turning towards the girl next to her who is currently struggling with the coffee maker, which really she should know how to use by now, she’s been working here for three weeks and the machine’s pretty basic.

She watches her for a minute without saying anything because, ignoring the unprofessionalism of not actually knowing how to do her job, the scene in front of her is actually kind of adorable. 

The new girl and bane of Nico’s existence, Karolina, is focusing very hard on the coffee maker in front of her, her face scrunched up in determination as she tries and fails to fix the grinder than she had somehow managed to get jammed up. She bites her bottom lip as she tries to get the problematic beans out, spilling half brewed coffee all over the counter and herself in the process, and Nico stifles a giggle, because _yes_ , somehow this girl manages to make her _giggle_ on a regular basis. 

The blonde turns towards her at the noise, a sheepish smile on her face as she wipes coffee off of her hands and onto her now stained apron. 

“Sorry,” she mumbles, and Nico believes she is, but she’s still not going to miss out on this opportunity to tease the other girl. 

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” she smirks. 

“Oh Nico, would you?” Karolina beams then, and what- oh _hell no_ , that was in no way an offer to clean up her mess, she just wanted to make fun of her. And _great_ , just fantastic, now Karolina’s grinning at her, and yeah, she would. For some reason, when it comes to Karolina, she just knows she always would. 

...She’s not entirely sure where that thought comes from, but she does know that now is definitely not the time to try and unpack it. 

“Yeah, okay,” she mumbles instead, making her way past the taller girl and towards the machine, resigned to having accidentally committed to cleaning up Karolina’s mess once again. 

“Thank you so much! I really owe you for this, I had no clue what I was doing,” she says happily as Nico sets to work on fixing the machine, rolling her eyes because _of course she had no idea, she didn’t pay attention in basic training…_

It takes a good twenty minutes, and Karolina disappears about five minutes in, presumably to try and get the coffee stains out of her shirt, or maybe to just head home since her shift’s about to end anyway, but either way leaving Nico to both repair the machine as well as serve the occasional customer who decided they wanted coffee at nearly nine at night. 

She’s just finishing up on the machine, don’t even get her started on the counter though, the counter’s an absolute mess, when the manager walks in. He’s a few years older than both Nico and Karolina, and ever since he was promoted he’s been very enthusiastic about surprise visits, and just _of course_ he has to drop by right now. 

“Nico,” he greets curtly, nodding his head as he takes in the state of the counter. 

“Hello, Vaughn,” she nods back, her jaw clenched in anticipation of the berating she’s about to receive. 

“This doesn’t look like how we do things here at Timely, does it?” he asks, and Nico doesn’t bother dignifying his question with an answer. 

“Care to remind me of what the Timely employee handbook section B, subsection twelve, article six says about maintaining a tidy workstation?” he asks, and Nico sighs inwardly, reciting the words that he’s made her memorize by heart while promising herself she’s going to kill the blonde the next time she sees her. 

—————

She doesn’t of course, though it’s not for lack of brooding about what happened. 

She doesn’t see Karolina again until a couple days after the coffee maker incident. Nico has Wednesdays off and they work different shifts Thursdays, so it’s not until Friday night that their schedules line up. 

“Hi Nico!” Karolina grins when she arrives, taking off her jacket and leaving it in the break room as she heads to the main room of the café and behind the counter, where the other girl is already getting started on prepping the coffee. 

“Hi Karolina,” Nico greets, and already she can feel her anger at the girl dissipating just by looking at her, and really she hates herself for it. 

She takes her place by the coffee machine, because she’s not looking to have a repeat of last time, and Karolina heads to the register to take orders. 

The beginning of the shift goes by fairly quickly, because despite the blonde’s propensity of messing up her tasks, she’s actually excellent company and Nico enjoys the conversations she has with her. 

They fall into an easy rhythm relatively early on, Karolina happily chatting with the customers while Nico ends up stuck with making every single drink, though she supposes that it’s still better than letting the other girl try and end up getting yelled at by Vaughn for another half hour. 

Two hours have passed now, and Nico’s just finishing her ten minute lunch break that she managed to squeeze in during the quietest time of the day, and as such is an awkward time to actually eat lunch, but at least this way she can minimize the chances of Karolina actually having to make coffee for someone. 

She’s eating in the break room because Vaughn has incredibly strict rules about eating behind the counter or, heaven forbid, actually sitting at one of the tables that doesn’t wobble like the one in the break room does. She means to finish up quickly and head back out there before something goes terribly wrong, but really it’s just so nice to have a bit of quiet, and to not have to worry about how easily she gives in to whatever the other girl wants. Or what it might mean that’s she willing to do pretty much anything for the girl. 

Just as she finishes the last bite of her sandwich, a loud crash can be heard coming from the main room, muttered curses following a second later, and _huh_ , she hadn’t pegged Karolina as a swearer. 

She quickly rushes out to see what’s going on, only to find the blonde looking on the verge of tears, standing in the middle of the broken shards of glass and scattered coffee beans that are currently covering the floor. 

“Hey, it’s fine,” Nico’s quick to reassure her, even though really it’s far from fine, this girl is honestly going to cost her her job someday, those beans are super expensive. 

Obviously she’s not about to say that though, Karolina looks genuinely upset, and seeing her like this makes Nico honestly just _hurt_ , which is weird because really she doesn’t usually care about people. Especially people who only ever seem to cause problems for her and get her into trouble. 

She tentatively steps towards the taller girl, but stops when the blonde finally turns her head and meets her eyes. 

“I’m sorry,” Karolina says quietly. “Ever since I got here, I’ve just been ruining things. I can’t do anything right.”

“Hey, no, that’s not true,” Nico insists, against her better judgement, because here the girl in front of her is, saying everything Nico’s been thinking these past few weeks out loud, and suddenly she doesn’t believe any of it anymore, really all she wants now is to show the other girl that none of it is true. 

“I was a mess when I first started working here too,” she continues. “Don’t even worry about it, it could’ve happened to anyone, and it won’t even take that long to clean up anyways.”

“Nico, would you?” Karolina asks then, a small smile coming back to her face as she does, and Nico absolutely hates how happy it makes her to have been able to cheer her up. 

“Yeah, don’t worry about it,” the shorter girl nods, because even though she’d really rather not deal with yet another of the other girl’s messes, she really hates how upset Karolina seems. Despite how much she’s trying to convince herself she doesn’t care. 

They manage to make short work of sweeping up the shattered glass and broken beans on the floor, falling back into their earlier routine as if they had never stopped once they finish. 

Her shift’s just wrapping up and Nico’s looking forward to meeting up with Gert afterwards, because as much as she’s enjoyed spending time with Karolina despite her best efforts, she could use a break from doing the majority of the work that was supposed to make up _both_ their shifts. 

She’s just taking off her apron and is about to head into the break room to grab her stuff when slender fingers wrap lightly around her wrist, pulling her back ever so slightly, and she can’t help the way she swallows hard at the contact. 

She turns around slowly to find herself face to face with Karolina, and if her eyes flit down to the taller girl’s lips for a second before they find her eyes again, it’s only because of the height difference. 

“Nico, could I talk to you for a second?” the blonde asks then, and Nico has to take a second to clear her throat before she can respond because suddenly it’s gotten very warm. Clearly there’s something wrong with the air conditioning, she’ll have to talk to Vaughn about it the next time he drops by. 

“Uh, yeah,” she manages after a pause that’s just slightly too long to not be awkward. “What’s up?”

“I just got a call from a family friend, and they have an emergency work thing so they want me to watch their daughter Molly,” she explains, and Nico nods slowly because she’s not really sure how this concerns her. 

“Oh okay,” the shorter girl says, because she’s not really sure what else she can say to that. 

“So is it cool if I head out early then?” she asks, motioning towards the door. “I know I have a couple more hours on my shift, but I’ve really got to get going.”

“Oh, uh, I mean you’ll need to find someone to cover it for you,” Nico explains, but really this should be obvious, right? Like of course she can’t just leave in the middle of her shift?

“Oh Nico, would you?” Karolina asks then, her face lighting up as she smiles broadly, and really Nico can’t say yes this time. Gert will be here any minute, it really wouldn’t be fair of her to agree to do this, she’s just going to have to tell Karolina that she’ll need to find someone else to cover for her. 

“Yeah, okay,” she says after a pause, immediately wincing because that did not go as planned. What happened to saying no? What is it about this girl that can get people to do whatever it is she wants?

“Thank you so much Nico!” the other girl practically squeals, wrapping Nico in a tight embrace that almost makes her think this is all worth it, until the hug ends just as suddenly as it started and Nico’s back to wishing she didn’t just give in to anything Karolina asked of her. Honestly, with the way things are going, the blonde could probably get her to take the blame for murder at this point. 

“Yeah… No problem…” Nico mumbles in response as Karolina rushes into the break room, the shorter girl rubbing the back of her neck as she watches her leave. “No problem at all…”

“Okay wait,” a voice says from the other side of the counter, startling Nico and causing her to quickly spin around. 

The owner of the voice is all too familiar, purple hair down to her shoulders and a huge grin across her face. It’s Gert, her best friend, and _wow_ is she a sight for sore eyes after the exchange Nico has just had. 

“So that’s her?” Gert asks excitedly, craning her neck to look through the door to the break room that Karolina had just left through. “The crazy girl who, and I quote, is basically a human ray of sunshine in the worst way imaginable?” 

“Yeah,” Nico says with an exasperated sigh. “Do you see what I mean now? She’s so happy all the time, but somehow she tricks you into doing her work for her!”

“Oh, I saw something alright. But it wasn’t that, my friend,” the purple haired girl responds with a knowing smile, and Nico can’t help but frown in response, because _what’s Gert going on about now?_

“You are _whipped_ ,” she states plainly, stretching out the last word, and for a second Nico doesn’t think she heard her right, because that’s just so far from the truth it’s not even funny. Right?

“What? No,” she responds, shaking her head with a frown. “I know you’re usually annoyingly good at reading me, but you’re like, _way_ off this time,” she laughs. 

“...Am I though?” Gert continues, an amused smile playing at her lips. “I mean, you talk about her all the time, you’ll do anything to make her happy, and like, you literally just watched her until she left the room…”

“Wait, seriously?” Nico asks then, a little incredulous because she kind of thought the other girl was just messing with her, but apparently she isn’t. Her _best friend_ actually seems to believe that she’s in love with the girl who’s basically her _worst enemy_. Which is so obviously not true. 

Gert grins then in response to Nico’s question, and probably at how worked up she’s getting about this, which clearly is only happening because of how _completely_ off base the other girl’s conclusion is. 

“Okay well, first of all, I only talk about her so much because she’s just _that_ terrible, always getting me to do her work. Which brings me to the second point, I only do things for her because she, like, _manipulates_ me into doing them, I’m sure she does that to everyone!” Nico explains exasperatedly. 

“Uh huh, sure,” Gert nods, clearly still teasing her. “And what about my last point?”

“I mean- I just- That’s just because we were talking, and I was annoyed that she tricked me again! I didn’t- I mean… It wasn’t like that!” she insists, stumbling over her words, and she can feel her cheeks heating up despite her best efforts. 

“Right…” Gert nods again, but really Nico knows there’s no way that she’s convinced, honestly she’s not even sure if she buys that last argument herself…

“I mean…” she mumbles, trying desperately to keep up her rebuttal of Gert’s points, but suddenly it’s hard when she’s not entirely sure that the other girl is wrong anymore. 

And, _oh_. So maybe Gert knows more than Nico gives her credit for. It might be possible that she’s maybe, a little bit, _slightly_ into this girl. And really that’s just great, because of course now everything is going to be that much more confusing when it comes to Karolina. 

“Oh god,” Nico says with a wince, burying her face in her hands as she leans against the counter in front of her. 

“There we go!” Gert exclaims happily, and Nico would roll her eyes at the other girl’s propensity for always having to be right, but she’s too busy reeling from her sudden realization to even bother. 

“I knew you’d come to your senses eventually,” the purple haired girl continues, and this time Nico manages to lift her head from her hands to narrow her eyes and glare at the other girl. 

“Well, I guess we’re postponing tonight, I’ll see you later!” Gert says with a much too wide smile, and Nico doesn’t bother dignifying her with a response as she forlornly turns to the customer who’s been patiently waiting for her to finish her personal crisis for the last five minutes. 

The woman on the other side of the counter gives her a sympathetic smile as she orders, but Nico ignores her as she sets to work on her coffee. 

The brooding expression she’s been wearing so often since Karolina came into her life doesn’t leave her face her entire shift, only falling away when she finally collapses into bed as soon as she gets home, completely exhausted. 

She most certainly _does not_ dream about the girl in question that night. 

—————

“You can’t hide from her forever, you do know that right?” Gert says with a laugh as she takes in Nico sprawled across her living room floor in her pyjamas, eyes glued to the horror movie currently playing on her television, only looking away from it when the purple haired girl speaks. 

“I can and I will,” Nico responds with a glare, sitting up and turning fully towards the other girl. “What are you even doing here anyways? Don’t you have work?”

“I do, yeah,” Gert nods. “And so do you. I’m here to make sure that you aren’t going to be an idiot and get yourself fired.”

“I’m not being an idiot…” the black haired girl mumbles in response, a frown on her face. 

“Uh huh, sure,” the other girl answers with a smirk. “Then why have you called in sick the past four days?”

“That’s not true,” Nico says, before continuing when Gert raises an eyebrow in challenge. “I didn’t on Wednesday.”

“You don’t work Wednesdays,” she responds as she rolls her eyes, and Nico slumps her shoulders. 

“Yeah, I know…”

“You really have to go in today, you know that right?”

“Yeah, I know…”

—————

Nico’s all frowns when she trudges into work that morning. It’s Friday, which means unless luck’s finally on her side, the blonde will certainly be working today. And this time, she doesn’t even get to leave early. Not that that really worked out for her last time, anyways...

Leaving her jacket in the break room, she pulls on her apron and takes her place behind the counter when she arrives, replacing her coworker Victor, who gives her an appreciative smile before taking off his apron and flopping down onto one of the stools. 

Nico raises an eyebrow as she looks at the boy in front of her. 

“Can I get you anything?” she asks eventually when he doesn’t say anything. 

“No, no I’m good,” he says with a knowing smile, and Nico’s brow furrows because this is weird, even for Victor. “I’m just glad you’re feeling better, you know?”

“Uh, thanks,” she nods in response, before getting to work making sure that everything is organized and ready behind the counter. She’s not entirely sure what’s going on. She and Victor have always been friendly, but they’ve never hung out when they weren’t both working. 

“So, last Friday my girlfriend Lillie was here picking up some coffee, as one does, and she overheard something,” he continues with a grin, and Nico suddenly realizes that she should’ve recognized the woman she served as Gert left that night. She’s seen her come by to pick Victor up after his shift often enough. But now that she’s found herself in this position, there’s really only one course of action she can take. 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says flatly as she continues to organize her workstation the way she prefers it when she’s behind the counter. 

“Okay, sure,” Victor grins. “But if you _did_ , then I would tell you not to mess this up, Minoru. She likes you too, you just have to get out of your head enough to take the chance.”

Nico glares at the boy then, ready to tell him that he really ought to mind his own business, when the door behind the counter swings open and Karolina steps out with a wide smile on her face. 

The blonde’s hair is different than usual, and Nico kind of hates that she notices it immediately, but how could she not? Her hair is tied in a careful braid that hangs over her shoulder and exposes her neck, complete with a blue ribbon woven through it, and Nico had never realized how attractive necks could be until now. 

So yeah, maybe Gert was a hundred percent right, and Nico really does like this girl. Like, a lot. 

She swallows, her mouth suddenly dry and manages to tear her eyes away from the girl approaching her to face Victor again. 

“Get out of here,” she hisses through gritted teeth, and the boy in question gives her a teasing smirk before standing from his seat. 

“Hi Nico! I’m glad you’re feeling better, I was starting to worry,” Karolina says then, coming to a stop next to the girl, and Nico would swear the blonde’s smile was bright enough to rival the sun. “Oh, hey Victor,” she continues as she notices the boy grinning at them from the other side of the counter. 

He opens his mouth to respond, but Nico quickly interrupts before he can. “Thanks. Victor was just leaving,” she supplies, because really the last thing she needs right now is for him to stick around and inevitably open his big mouth. There’s no way she’s following any of his advice- Karolina obviously doesn’t like her back, so there’s no way in _hell_ she’s going to do anything like what he’s suggesting. 

“Oh, okay,” Karolina responds, her brow furrowing confusedly as she looks between her two coworkers. 

“Uh, yeah, sorry! Got to run!” Victor says quickly when Nico levels him with a glare, and it isn’t long until he’s grabbed his stuff and all but bolted out of the store, leaving Nico and Karolina standing alone behind the counter, and so maybe she hadn’t entirely thought through sending away the only other person in the café. 

“Uh, hi,” she manages after a beat too long, but Karolina just gives her the smile that never fails to make her stomach do somersaults, which she’s only now realizing isn’t from disliking her like she had previously thought, but rather quite the opposite. _God_ she really was oblivious before Gert had shattered her reality.

“Hi,” Karolina smiles back, and neither of them move from where they’re standing, just staring at each other, the air around them suddenly filled with _something_ , but it all disappears just as quickly as it had appeared when the door chimes and some customers walk in, chatting happily on their way to work. 

Nico’s not sure if she’s thankful for or annoyed by the fact that Timely ends up so busy the rest of their shift that she barely gets a second to talk to Karolina, what with her constantly making coffees and the blonde taking the never ending string of orders. 

It seems like Karolina’s been getting better at her job, as while she still can’t handle the actually making coffee portion of the job description, she’s much more adept at taking orders and staying on top of things around the store, so overall the day goes by pretty smoothly. This time without any spilled coffee or coffee beans, which is a success in Nico’s books. 

Their shifts have just ended and Nico’s grabbing her things and getting ready to leave when Karolina approaches her again, and if she didn’t know any better the shorter girl would think that she was nervous. 

“Hey Nico,” the blonde says when she reaches her, smiling broadly, and Nico can’t help how her heart rate suddenly picks up just from talking to her. And really it’s just that much worse now that she knows it’s not from anger. 

“Hi Karolina,” she answers, a small smile playing at her lips as much as she tries to fight it. “What’s up?”

“I’m going out tonight,” the blonde replies quickly, and once again Nico would almost believe that she’s nervous.

“Okay?” the shorter girl answers, her brow furrowed, because she’s not entirely sure why the other girl is telling her this. 

“I was supposed to go with my friend Chase to this new bar downtown, but he cancelled last minute,” she continues with a frown. “Now I’ll have to go alone.”

“That sucks,” Nico offers as she shoulders her bag, ready to head out. She really needs to get out of here before she does something stupid like confess her feelings for this girl. 

“I’m sure you don’t _have_ to go alone though,” she continues, because surely someone as amazing as Karolina has dozens of friends who would be more than happy to join her. 

Of course, her words somehow backfire on her again, like they seem to have been doing so often as of late. 

“Oh Nico, would you?” Karolina says excitedly, her smile only widening and Nico can’t help but blink a few times before responding, because while that is not at all what she meant, she really should’ve seen this coming by now. 

“I mean…” she starts but quickly trails off when she notices just how excited the other girl is. And _okay_ , as much as she’s worried she might do something stupid, she also isn’t exactly looking to turn down spending more time with the girl. Especially if it’s just going to be the two of them. 

“Yeah, okay.”

“Great,” Karolina replies. “I’ll pick you up at eight.” And then she’s walking out the door, leaving a surprised Nico to watch her, a confused expression written across her face. 

—————

“It’s not a date!” Nico practically shouts into her phone for the umpteenth as she finishes getting dressed, pulling on her shoes. 

“I mean… it sure _sounds_ like a date,” Gert laughs from the other end of the line. 

“Well, it’s not. We’re just friends!” she insists again as she leaves her apartment, locking the front door behind her and shoving her keys into her pocket. “I’m only going because her friend cancelled on her.”

“Okay, sure,” the purple haired girl replies, and Nico can hear the smirk in her voice as she does. 

“I hate you,” Nico mumbles into her phone, promptly pressing the end call button as a car pulls to a stop in front of her. 

“Hey,” she breathes then as she leans down to look in through the window of the car. 

“Hi Nico,” Karolina beams broadly, and as much as Nico knows that this is a terrible idea, she can’t help the matching smile that splits her face as she climbs into the car next to the blonde. 

“So where are we headed?” she asks as they pull out onto the street. 

“This new bar called Gibborim. It’s supposed to be pretty cool!” Karolina smiles, and Nico has to look away before she says something she knows she’s going to regret. 

The ride there isn’t too long, and they chat idly for a bit before falling into a mostly comfortable silence, though Nico does roll Gert’s words around in her ahead about how this whole thing seems to be a date, and honestly she’s not entirely sure what she hopes the answer is. 

It’s not long until they pull up down the street from the bar, Karolina somehow managing to find parking despite how crowded the bar seems to be, and _really?_ Does everything just go perfectly for this girl?

They make their way inside, and it’s crowded, and it’s loud, and under normal circumstances Nico would absolutely hate everything about it. But Karolina’s here so she almost doesn’t mind it. Not that she’d ever admit that to anyone, herself included. 

“Do you want to grab a drink?” Karolina asks her over the general din of the conversations of the other bar goers, and Nico nods in response, and pretty soon they’re both seated at one of the bar height tables around the edges of the space, drinks in hand. 

It’s awkward for a solid minute, but then Karolina grins at her sheepishly and Nico can’t help but laugh, and soon the blonde joins in too, and then everything’s just… easy. They talk and laugh, falling into the same kind of casual conversation that makes their shifts together go by so quickly. 

An hour and two drinks later, Karolina’s finally able to talk Nico into getting up and dancing with her. She wants to say no, but the way the blonde’s looking at her now has her convinced that she’d do anything she ever asks of her, and she’s not sure if it’s the alcohol, or just her general proximity to the girl, but for the first time she thinks that maybe that’s not such a terrible thing. 

“I’m really happy you came,” Karolina smiles at her as they dance, as friends of course, and Nico’s okay with that, she has to be. 

“Yeah, me too,” she nods, and the blonde’s smile only widens. 

“It’s lucky your friend cancelled, I’m glad you invited me,” Nico continues, not caring if she’s showing her hand, if maybe she’s acting too excited about this whole thing for it to be purely platonic. Especially with the way the two girls seem to be gravitating towards each other, dancing closer and closer after each song ends and a new one begins. 

“Oh, uh, yeah, me too,” the blonde responds, an uncomfortable expression crossing her face, disappearing practically before Nico can even register it in the first place. 

And okay, _noted_ , that was maybe a little much, and Nico definitely needs to dial it back a bit, now that it’s been made perfectly clear that Karolina only invited her out as friends. 

They dance for a while, Nico making sure to stay out of the blonde’s space, even though it seems like she keeps moving closer, but it’s probably just wishful thinking on the shorter girl’s part. 

Suddenly they’re interrupted by a loud laugh, a young man with blonde hair up in a bun coming over, laying a friendly hand on Karolina’s shoulder and offering the girl a lopsided grin. 

Karolina suddenly looks uncomfortable, and Nico’s worried for a second, until the other girl opens her mouth to speak. 

“Chase? What are you doing here?” she asks, and that’s right, this is Chase. Nico’s seen him a few times when he was picking Karolina up after her shift or dropping her off in the morning. 

“I told you Alex and I were going out tonight!” he explains, and Karolina glances nervously over at Nico, and right, even in her less-than-sober state she remembers why Karolina had invited her out in the first place. Chase had cancelled on her, except that apparently he hadn’t. 

After a few minutes of casual, if slightly uncomfortable, conversation, Chase excuses himself when he spots Alex waving him over.

As soon as he leaves, Karolina turns to the shorter girl, eyes wide in panic. 

“Okay, so,” she starts, and Nico raises an eyebrow because from where she’s standing, it seems like the blonde lied to her to manipulate her into coming out with her. 

She’s not entirely sure what her motivation would have been, but no matter the case, it would seem that she might have been right about her original theory of Karolina tricking people into doing what she wanted. 

“Oh god, Nico, I’m so, so sorry,” she says then, and honestly she’s looking close to tears and suddenly Nico’s not sure what she should believe anymore. 

“I don’t understand,” the shorter girl manages, her brows furrowed, because the truth is that despite everything, she did _trust_ Karolina, and her trust isn’t something she gives easily. 

“I’m sorry,” the blonde tries again, almost reaching out for Nico but thinking better of it, pulling her hand back at the last second. 

Karolina takes a deep breath then, her eyes meeting Nico’s, and the shorter girl searches blue eyes for _something_ , even if she’s not entirely sure what. 

She wants so badly for what Gert said earlier to be true, for this to actually be a date, because as much as she tried to deny how she feels for the girl in front of her, the truth is that she has feelings for her, and would really love to explore where they might lead should she feel the same way. 

She’s just so confused right now. 

“Okay, I clearly owe you an explanation, and you’re probably going to hate me anyways, but here it is,” Karolina starts, her voice thicker than usual, and Nico can just barely make out the sheen of unshed tears in her eyes in the dim lighting of the bar. 

“I’ve had a huge crush on you since we met,” she blurts out quickly, and Nico’s eyes widen because that was very much _not_ what she had been expecting the other girl to say. 

But before she can come up with anything remotely resembling a response, Karolina continues. 

“Honestly that’s really the only reason I’ve stayed at Timely so long. I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, but I kind of suck at my job,” she explains, letting out a watery laugh. 

“You’re just… I mean, Nico, you’re amazing! You’ve been nothing but nice to me even though I’m sure I can’t be making your life easier, and you always stand up for yourself, even when the customers are being complete jerks and it would be easier not to. You’re never afraid to be yourself, and that’s something I really admire.”

Nico can’t help the way her heart rate is picking up at the other girl’s words, because nobody’s ever said anything like this to her before, and she can feel herself falling even further for the girl in front of her as the words spill out of the blonde’s mouth. 

“I’ve been meaning to ask you out for such a long time now, but I was scared that you didn’t feel the same way and it would be too awkward to work together anymore,” Karolina continues, full on rambling now, and honestly Nico’s about ready to forgive her already. “So I figured this was a good way to test the waters, I guess? I don’t even know what I was thinking anymore, to be honest.”

Sure, she might’ve messed up by lying to Nico like that, but she’s apologizing now, and all things considered, what she did wasn’t even that bad. 

“Oh god, this is so embarrassing,” Karolina says then, burying her face in her hands. “I guess I managed to ruin everything anyways though, huh? It probably doesn’t even matter, to be honest. We’re too different, there’s no way we would’ve worked out. I’m so sorry, I should just go,” she continues, stumbling over her words, and Nico knows she needs to say something, but the words aren’t coming, and suddenly Karolina’s turning and rushing out of the bar, leaving the shorter girl too stunned to do anything but watch her leave. 

Lucky for Nico, she’s always been good at improvising, and once the initial shock of having the girl she only just realized she doesn’t hate, but rather has feelings for, all but confess her love for her has worn off, she’s out the door and heading down the street to where Karolina had parked her car, desperately hoping she’s not too late. 

She’s relieved to find the blonde still there, leaning back against her car, head buried in her hands. 

“Karolina, hey,” she says softly as she approaches so as not to startle the girl, and the blonde looks up from her hands, the tear tracks running down her face making Nico’s heart ache. 

“I was just going to go, but then I remembered that I’m your ride,” the blonde explains as she wipes at her face with her sleeve. “Do you want me to drive you home?”

“What? No, that’s not why I followed you,” Nico says quickly, shaking her head as she looks up at the blonde, brown eyes meeting blue. “I wanted to talk about what you said. You never gave me the chance to answer.”

Karolina breaks eye contact then, looking away uncomfortably. 

“Nico, it’s fine. You don’t have to say anything, I get it. You don’t feel the same way, you don’t need to explain,” she says, before finally looking back at the shorter girl again. “Honestly, if you really want to help, could you please just forget about this whole night?” she asks earnestly, her eyes pleading, and Nico’s taken by surprise. 

“You want me to pretend that none of this ever happened?” she asks, brow furrowing, because the way she sees it, everything is finally working out, if only Karolina will just listen to her long enough for her to tell her how she feels. 

“Nico, would you?” the blonde asks, and yeah, if that’s what Karolina really wants, then of course Nico would do whatever she asks of her. If there’s one thing she’s realized during her week wallowing on her living room floor in front of the television, it’s that she really would do anything for Karolina. 

She’s about to say yes, to agree to drop this and pretend it never happened. She’s about to break her own heart just to make Karolina happy, and she would do it happily, without question, except… shouldn’t Karolina know how Nico feels before she makes this decision? It’s only fair that she knows where they both stand on the matter, right?

Nico takes a deep breath, then another, before finally meeting Karolina’s eyes, a determined expression on her face. 

“No,” she says simply, and the blonde’s brow furrows adorably in confusion. 

“What?” she asks. 

“I mean, yes, totally, I will one hundred percent pretend that this never happened if that’s what you want, but first, before we forget this whole thing, I want to tell you how I feel,” she explains, her heart racing as her body finally catches up with what she’s doing, and just how much she’s putting on the line here considering she’s someone who doesn’t typically talk about her feelings. At all. 

“You said you didn’t think we would work out because we’re so different, right?” Nico starts, and Karolina nods skeptically in response. “Well I think you’re wrong. I think that’s exactly why we actually have a chance at something great. Something that I would really hate for either of us to miss out on, because the truth is I really like you too.”

“I thought I didn’t at first, but that’s just because I was too stubborn to see how special you are. But now that I’ve realized, yeah, I really like you Karolina. I like how you’re always so positive, even when things suck, and how you’re so friendly with all the customers, even when _they_ suck. You're amazing. Really, I just like you in general, is what I'm trying to say," she continues, wincing at the conclusion, because that was maybe not the most _eloquent_ speech she’s ever delivered, but it was from the heart, and that’s what counts. She hopes. 

Nico’s honestly starting to freak out a bit when Karolina doesn’t say anything at first, instead staring at Nico with wide eyes, her mouth slightly open. 

“Uh, so what I’m saying is, just, I mean- I think it would be cool if we gave this a shot,” she manages awkwardly, but it seems to be enough to remind Karolina that she actually needs to say _something_. 

“No, yeah, I got that,” the blonde nods, her stunned expression not leaving her face. 

“Oh okay, cool,” Nico says. “I mean, if you still want to pretend that this never happened, that’s okay too, I just wanted to-” she starts, until she’s suddenly cut off by warm lips pressed against her own, swallowing whatever else she had been planning on saying. 

Her hands reach up to tangle in Karolina’s hair as she kisses her sweetly at first, then more hungrily as Nico steps forward, even closer to the girl and effectively pressing her up against her car. 

They eventually have to break for air, and Nico can’t help but grin as she meets the blonde’s eyes. 

“Whoa,” she breathes, and Karolina grins back at her in response. 

“Yeah.” 

“So just to be clear-” Nico starts, but Karolina cuts her off with a laugh. 

“We’re not pretending tonight never happened,” she smiles, and Nico’s quick to nod her agreement. 

“Okay, good,” she says, before leaning in and kissing the girl again, only stopping when both of their grins become too much for them to feasibly continue. “Because I never want to forget this.”

—————

“Nico, would you?” Karolina’s asking a year and a half later, down on one knee. 

And yeah, Nico definitely would.


End file.
